Water deficit can have adverse effects on plants such as yield reductions, increased susceptibility to disease and pests, reduced plant growth and reproductive failure. An object of this invention is to provide plants which can express genes to ameliorate the adverse effects of water deficit. Useful genes for expression especially during water deficit are genes which promote aspects of plant growth or fertility, genes which impart disease resistance, genes which impart pest resistance, and the like.
Considering the complexity of water use in land plants, especially during conditions that produce water deficit, relatively few genes specifically associated with this aspect of physiology have been identified. It would be of benefit to the art to increase the number and variety of genes involved in regulating water use in plants, more particularly, in corn plants, and even more particularly in corn plants experiencing water deficit. It would be especially advantageous to identify transcription factors which can be used in directing the production of proteins which are beneficial to the plant when produced during water deficit.
Transcription factors are investigated for improving plant properties and traits in transgenic plants. Reference is made to WO 02079403 of Mendel Biotechnology, Inc. which claims priority from U.S. application Ser. No. 09/823,676 (incorporated herein by reference) for a disclosure of a variety of Arabidopsis thaliana transcription factors including one identified as G1073 which are alleged to be useful for modifying plant biomass, for methods of building DNA constructs which express transcript factors, and for methods of producing transformed plants with DNA constructs which express transcription factors.
One of the goals of plant genetic engineering is to produce plants with agronomically, horticulturally or economically important traits including tolerance to any of a variety of environmental stresses such as water deficit. Many transgenic crop plants have recombinant DNA that confers herbicide and/or pest resistance traits. Incorporation of additional recombinant DNA for conferring crop improvement traits in crop plants presents a challenge of using DNA constructs of increased complexity.